Published as a separate and in The Journal of Sports, 1983, 72, 1-2.

EFFECTS OF GYMNASTIC PARTICIPATION OF HIGH ESTEEM ATHLETIC GIRLS ON EATING DISORDER AND SELF ESTEEM
Departments of Athletics, Lehigh University

SUSAN L. SWAN, HENREY O. PATTERSON, AND KRISTIN M. CAMACHO

SUMMARY

The purpose of this study was to investigate the effects of gymnastic participation of high esteem athletic, 13 year old girls on eating disorders and self esteem. Twenty athletics girls (without eating disorders) were randomly divided into a control group (participated in no formal gymnastic activity but other activities) and an experimental group (participated in only gymnastic activity).
At the end of a 6 week gymnastics program the two groups were significantly different in physical attributes and emotional stability, indicating the efficacy of the experimental treatment. There was a increase in outburst of anger, mood swings, loss of weight, decreased growth, and loss of appetite.

A. INTRODUCTION

Coaches tend to promote physical ability on the premise that extreme discipline, dedication, and perfectionism will develop the perfect athlete. It is believed that by a constricted diet, rigid workouts and less social time will result in developing the perfect athlete. Empirical studies have substantiated these beliefs in part. Bass (1) found that girls enrolled in gymnastics were more likely to feel as thought they were fat or had something wrong with them. In a similar study Petterson (4) found that girls that had done gymnastics seemed to feel worse about themselves. Carr (2) found that with watching gymnastics, girls wished that they had the body that was shown on the television program due to them feeling that the body seen on television had no flaws.
These studies suggest that by exposing normal, young high esteem athletic girls to the atmosphere of perfection later leads them to believe that they have imperfections of their own body and that they should do something to fix their imperfections. The purpose of this study was to examine the effects of a gymnastics program on whether or not the thirteen year old girls would endure a eating disorder.

a. Tennessee's Little Tumblers. The gymnastic program selected was Tennessee's Little Tumblers located in Nashville, Tennessee. Tennessee's Little Tumblers is a very competitive and disciplined gymnastics facility and has been critiqued by many journalists, including Rye (6). Here the girls were exposed to tiny little other thirteen year old girls doing amazing stunts. All of the former gymnasts were also in leotards.
b. Arizona Self Concept Scale. The Arizona Self Concept Scale was developed by Mitts (3) and has a reliability of .95. Ss rated items describing relationships to peers, family and self as to how descriptive they were of themselves on a five - point scale from strong agree to strongly disagree.
c. The Scale Method. The Scale Method was developed by Quinn (5). After the six weeks had passed the 20 girls were weighed to see if their previous weight was effected due to enrolling into athletics.
1 Received in the Editorial office on October 16, 1972, and published immediately at Portland, Oregon. Copyright by The Portland press.
2 This experiment was supported in part by a Faculty Research Fellowship granted to Henrey O. Patterson and Kristin M. Camacho by LeHigh University.
3 Requests for reprints should be sent to the third author at the address shown at the end of this article.

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